the blight upon your blighted life
by Lorata
Summary: (WARNING: CHILD ABUSE) Peacekeepers are supposed to save you, but sometimes they don't. Sometimes "keeping the peace" means protecting the people with power and never mind who else gets hurt. Sometimes nobody comes to save you after all. For Sloane, dying in the Arena will be the escape she's wanted since she was six years old. The trick is surviving until she gets there.


NOTE THE WARNING: This piece deals with the sexual abuse of a minor over a period of many years. All abuse is implied/offscreen and nothing is graphically depicted, but it is the major theme throughout. Step carefully.

This piece acts as a companion to Mirror, Mirror.

* * *

The first time it happens, you're six years old.

He asks you, and you say no, because you don't understand what it means but it makes you uneasy in your stomach. And you and Mom might fight a lot but Mom always says you shouldn't do things that you don't want to do unless there's a good reason, and that works pretty good for you. It means you eat your vegetables even though vegetables are gross, because vegetables also make you healthy and strong and you want to be healthy and strong. It means you take baths because all kinds of bugs live in dirt, and you don't want to get sick from the bugs and die. But it also means Mom doesn't make you go to bed when you're not tired if you have something important to finish like the exciting part of a book, and if you've almost won the pretend Hunger Games you've been playing you don't have to come in for dinner until you're done because cold food isn't a big deal.

You say no, and your heart beats hard in your chest because what if he doesn't understand Mom's rules, what if he tries to make you, but he just smiles. He smiles and he bends down on one knee and puts his hand on your shoulder. "Sloane," he says. "You know I love your mom, right?"

You don't know that, how are you supposed to know that? You don't even have a boyfriend at school. Carver Hannigan tried to kiss you on the playground and you pushed him into the mud. Grownup stuff is way more complicated. But you don't say any of that, you just nod, and maybe he'll explain it better.

"I want us to be a family," he says. "I want us to love and trust each other, and that means you and me, too. That means you should trust me. Don't you want to be a family, Sloane? Don't you want your mom to be happy?"

You do, of course you do, and so even though your stomach makes funny squiggles and your legs really want to run away, you say yes.

Afterward the feeling in your stomach is even worse. There are snakes in your stomach and you want to throw them all up until there's nothing left. You want to go outside and run run run around the house until your muscles ache and your lungs burn and the rest of the world feels very far away. You want to cry and curl up under the bed in a very small ball, or take a hot bath until your skin turns pink and shiny and your fingers wrinkle up.

It doesn't make sense, that feeling. You did what he told you to, and it's to make Mom happy, so that's a good thing. You try to swallow the feeling and hope that it goes away soon.

"You're a good girl," he says. "I can tell you love your mom a lot. That's why we don't have to tell her about this, right?"

That makes you frown. "Why?"

"Because this is about you and me," he explains. "I don't tell you about what your mom and me do, because that's private. You and me, that's private too. We don't need to tell anyone else because it's not their business."

You promise not to tell because he's right, that's private, and also because the awful sick feeling is still there and you don't think you have the words to try to say why. But this is for Mom, and Mom's rule is that you get to say no unless it's important, and this is important, just like broccoli and baths and going to school even on rainy days when you don't want to walk.

You don't talk much at dinner, but Mom doesn't notice because he takes her hand and holds it all the way through the meal. She's smiling, not a huge grin with teeth but it goes all the way to her eyes, and her eyes are soft and she keeps looking down to laugh and yeah, okay. It's for Mom. You can do a lot of things you don't like when it matters.

* * *

And so the next time, and the next time, and the next time, you say yes, even when you don't want to, because that's the rules. It's also a secret, and it's very important not to break secrets. Families need to trust each other, and he can't trust you if you tell other people your most important secret, and so you don't tell Mom or the teachers or your friends at school.

Except nobody ever told you how hard it is to keep secrets. Time goes by and you turn seven but you still have the secret, and you thought maybe it would stop by now but it doesn't. You start to hate bedtime because it always happens at night, late when the lights are off and Mom goes to sleep because she works early in the mornings. At first you try staying up, playing in your room with the light on, but he just says it's very late for good little girls to be awake and maybe he should help you get ready for bed.

Carrying the secret is heavy, heavier than the biggest rock in the playground you tried to carry on a dare. The worst part is that your friends don't have secrets like this. You try asking once, at a sleepover, when the lights are off and everyone cuddles under the blankets and whispers. Carla says she broke her mom's favourite perfume bottle, the really expensive one her dad traded for, and then locked the dog in her mom's room so she'd think he did it. Miranda says when she was little she dropped her baby brother and he landed on his head and now he's not good at spelling words and she thinks it's her fault.

None of them have a secret like yours. You went last on purpose, and when it's your turn you don't tell them. You make up a lie about saying you eat your broccoli when you really sneak it into your sock and then hide it in the backyard, so probably one day there will be a huge broccoli forest. The others tell you that's a dumb secret. You tell them they should shut up. It takes a long time for everyone to fall asleep after that even though it's quiet, because it's the kind of quiet that's sharp and hurts when you bump up against it.

And it's funny, but you start to hate your friends because they don't have this secret. You can't talk to them, can't hear them complain about their mom's strict rules or their dad saying they can't have cake every day just because it's a Victory year , and a strange fire starts glowing inside you. You can't tell them and they don't understand and soon you can't even talk to them anymore without feeling the anger bubbling.

Your friends stop being your friend. They tell you that you're not their friend anymore. That you're mean and rude and they don't like you and don't want to play with you anymore. That's fine, you don't care. At recess a boy laughs at you for standing in the corner of the playground all by yourself, and you punch him in the face. He's not laughing anymore when the teachers pull you away, not laughing with blood smeared all over his face and his arms held tight around his head.

You laugh, though, and funny enough that's what gets you in the most trouble.

* * *

When you were six you said yes, even though you didn't want to, because that's the rules and it's important. One day you say no, you don't want to, you don't want to do it ever again, just to see what happens. It happens anyway, that's what, and so next time you say yes because that way it's over faster. But then another day you say no, because Meredith pretended to save you a seat at lunch but when you went to sit Carmen pulled out the chair and you fell on your butt and everyone laughed.

You're too mad to say yes and so you say no, and you say no again and again, louder and louder, even though Mom would say that's a _tantrum_ and girls who are old enough to get noticed by the Program are _too old for tantrums, Sloane_.

It happens anyway. And it never feels very good, not even the first time, not even the days when he's in a good mood and smiling and his hands are soft, but this is the first time it hurts. _Really_ hurts, and after you cry as quiet as you can, hands over your face because you're not a baby and you hate for him to see it.

"This is what happens, Sloane," he says, his face all serious. He was angry and ugly before but now it's like the time you skinned your knee. He strokes your hair and you want to bite his fingers but you don't. You don't know what he'll do, and you can't decide if that's scarier than knowing but you don't want to find out. "Isn't it easier when you're nice to me?"

You don't say no after that, because it doesn't matter. You don't say yes, but that doesn't matter either.

* * *

When you're eight your class has Parents Day, where everyone brings their moms or dads and they all talk about the work they do. You don't pay attention to most of it, you don't pay attention to school very much at all anymore, but then Cassidy's dad gets up to talk and he's a Peacekeeper. He has a bright white uniform and his hair is shiny and his teeth are white like his uniform. He looks like the people from the Program, the ones who talked to you at school and invited you to play after school at the big building where you get to be as rough as you want and eat all kinds of tasty snacks. That's more interesting than Jonas' dad who works at the general store, and so you sit up a little and listen.

Peacekeepers are here to protect people, says Cassidy's dad. They're here to make sure nobody gets hurt and everyone is safe and everyone obeys the rules. "If you ever see anything," Cassidy's dad says, with a very serious face, "you can call the Peacekeepers. If you see somebody doing something wrong, or something you think is wrong, call us and we'll take care of it. We're here for you."

You think about that all the way through the rest of the day, the walk home, all the way through dinner. That night when he comes into your room you tell him no, and when he sighs and shakes his head you remember what Cassidy's dad said, what the trainers at the Centre said about being strong and brave. You plant your feet and you raise your head and you make your eyes hard and narrow and you tell him that if he touches you you'll call the Peacekeepers.

He's supposed to back off. He's supposed to get scared, because Peacekeepers answer to no one but the Capitol, said Cassidy's dad, and nobody wants the Peacekeepers to come after them. He's not supposed to laugh, not supposed to reach down and grab your arm and twist, so that the fire shoots through to your shoulder but there's no mark left behind.

"Go ahead," he says, in a voice that's calm and slithering like a snake. "Call them. They won't believe you. No one will believe you, because you're just a little girl and I'm an adult, and little girls lie and adults tell the truth."

"I will," you tell him, because he probably thinks you're not being serious. He probably thinks it's just a threat, like the time you told Mom you would run away if she didn't let you join the Program. "Touch me and I'll do it."

It hurts that night, but it's been hurting more nights than not recently, so that doesn't make much of a difference. After he leaves you sneak out of your room, downstairs to the table with the phone and the pad of paper and pen Mom uses to take messages, but when you get there the table is empty.

That's okay, though, because he can't take away the phone when Mom is home and awake or she'd ask why, and so you wait. You wait until he and Mom are having grownup time in their bedroom, and you sneak into the living room and you pick up the phone real quiet and you dial the number that Cassidy's dad made you all repeat back to show you learned it. The Peacekeepers answer, and you tell them that he touches you and you don't like it and that it hurts, and you hang up real fast and run away to your room before anyone hears you.

The Peacekeepers show up at dinnertime. Mom looks confused, and a little scared, but he shakes his head and says it's okay, he'll talk to them, whatever it is. They go out on the porch and talk, and you try to eat but you can't, there's too much pressure in your chest and a rock in your throat, and so you stare at your plate and mash your food into paste with the back of your fork.

Then the Peacekeepers come back in, and one of them comes over to you, face all solemn, and your heart runs runs runs in your chest and it's hard to breathe. "Young lady," he says, and this is the part where he says it's okay, this is the part where they promise to take him away from here so you'll be safe, you know it. "Calling the Peacekeepers is very serious. You can't call and make things up just because you're angry at someone, that's illegal."

"What?" Mom says, looking back and forth between you. "What's going on?"

The Peacekeeper laughs, all fake-friendly the way grownups do when they don't care what the kids think. "Seems like your daughter didn't like being told to do her homework, so she called the precinct and tried to have your husband arrested."

"Sloane!" Mom bursts out. "Is that true?"

He comes back inside with the rest of the Peacekeepers, all of them laughing and slapping each other on the back. He looks at you, narrows his eyes and smiles, small and nasty, and you can't answer. You push your chair back from the table so fast it almost topples, and you run to your room and slam the door. You pull your pillow over your head so you don't have to hear Mom apologizing to the Peacekeepers and telling them it won't happen again.

That night he holds you by the hair, his breath hot against your ear as he whispers, "I told you they wouldn't believe you."

That night it hurts more than it's ever hurt before but you can't even care anymore. The next morning at breakfast Mom tells you how disappointed she is, says you're not getting any dessert for the rest of the month until you learn how to behave like a good little girl. She tries to make you apologize to him ("What would we have done if they'd believed you, if they'd gotten him in trouble? Did you ever think about that?") but you won't, and so Mom says no dessert for two months, even though that means missing next Parcel Day.

At the Centre that day you start a fight after dodgeball with the boy who pretended you hadn't hit him with the ball when you totally had. You hit him until he falls down and can't get up, hit him until the trainers tell you to stop and let him up. The trainers give you dessert because he cried and you didn't, and the fight makes you feel a little better, so at least something good happened.

* * *

When you're ten you run away.

At the Centre you're learning weapons now, and that's great when you're there but it makes it so much worse at home when you don't have swords or knives or trainers to call _stop_ when it goes too far. It starts to ruin the Centre too, because what good is all the training and the fighting and all the skills the trainers teach you if you can't even protect yourself at home?

And so you prepare to run away. Not all at once, because you're smart and you know better than that. You plan it bit by bit, saving up your allowance and hiding it in a box at the back of your closet. You get more allowance if you say yes and pretend like you want it, and so you do exactly that. He's so pleased you don't fight him anymore that he gives double allowance for two whole weeks, and you throw up in the bathroom every night after but he's gone by then so it's fine.

When you're ready you take your money and your clothes and you put them all in your school backpack, and you pretend you're going to school but instead you turn the opposite corner and head away to the edge of town. It's a great plan, because school lasts until two and then you go to the Centre and that means you have until five before he or Mom notice you're not where you need to be. By the time they figure it out you'll be on the train and out of here, off to a city where people actually listen and care.

Except it's not a great plan after all, because you forgot that grownups don't trust kids who are out on their own. As the morning goes on, people start asking why you're not in school, and you make up reasons but they give you a suspicious face and so you have to run. You try to sneak so nobody will see you, but somebody must have called the Peacekeepers because they find you when you get to the train station and try to buy a ticket.

You try to tell them, but the Peacekeepers don't listen. They put you in the back of their car and drive you right back home, and they call him at work and wait in the driveway until he gets back before they leave. You see them laugh and joke with him and promise to come over on Friday for a few beers and to watch the Games recap, and when they're gone he drags you inside and twists your arm again.

"If you ever try anything like that again you'll be sorry," he says, his face up close to yours. You could bite his nose if you tried, and for a second you're really, really tempted. "You think you hate it here now? Just wait and see what happens if you try to cross me. Now come inside and show me you're sorry and maybe I won't tell your mother what you did."

* * *

When you're eleven you steal a knife from the weapons room and smuggle it home under your clothes. You eat your dinner and talk about school and the project you're working on about the Dark Days, and you smile and laugh at his jokes and you ask Mom if you can have an extra serving of vegetables. Mom kisses you goodnight and says she's glad to see you happy.

Later that night, when he comes in to see you, you wait until he's close and then you lash out with the knife. You don't stab, you slash, just like they taught you at the Centre, and the knife rips a jagged tear in his shirt and the blood spurts out hot and red. He stares down in shock for a good long second while you scramble back and shift your grip on the knife, holding it backhand to get as much arm strength behind your next blow as you can.

It doesn't happen. Instead he hits you so hard you fall backwards, right into the edge of your desk. You feel your skull slam into the hard corner, feel the pain explode out as your vision turns bright with stars, and then you don't feel anything after that.

You wake up in the hospital. Your head hurts, your nose hurts, and one eye won't open properly. There's a bandage wrapped around your skull, and the doctor talking to the nurse by your bed uses words like _concussion_ and _contusion_ and other things that she doesn't think you understand except you're in the Program, you know what those mean.

You also hear them say the word _accident_ at the same time that his laughter rings out in the hallway, friendly and loud, the way that means he's charming whoever's out there. You lean back against the thin white pillow and pull the thin white blanket up to your chest and close your eyes. You'd cry but your eye is swelled too much to let the tears out and it wouldn't help anyway, and so you turn your face to the window and hum the Panem Anthem until you fall asleep again.

There's an investigation. Peacekeepers come to the house, not the ones who patrol the streets but official-looking people in suits, and they apologize a lot and say things like _formality_ and _the hospital raised concerns_ and _this won't take long don't worry_. Mom is furious, her face splotched pink and white with embarrassed fury as she answers the officers' questions in short, clipped tones, her arms crossed tight over her chest.

"It's all right, Ma'am," they tell her. "We just have to make sure we cross all our t's and dot our I's so we can make this go away. Nobody's accusing you of anything."

Nobody asks you what happened, but by now that's not a surprise.

* * *

By the time you're twelve, you know enough that you could hurt him if you wanted to, even without a knife. You try to keep it from your eyes, try not to look defiant, but it doesn't work. You know it doesn't work because he grabs your arm, pulls you in close and strokes two fingertips down the side of your face.

"I know you're counting down until you turn thirteen," he says, and you freeze, holding yourself very still. "What you might not realize is that you need your guardians to sign the papers before they'll let you into Residential. If you want me to sign anything, you'll have to do exactly what I tell you." You say nothing but you can't help your nostrils flaring, the breath coming harder in your chest, and he steps in even closer. "And I want you to tell me that you like it."

* * *

When you're thirteen, after the physical and the death list and the weapons test, the trainers put you in a room with a small furry creature. It looks up at you with big, dark eyes, too stupid to know you're going to hurt it because it's lived in a cage its entire life behind hand-fed so that it trusts humans and won't run away. The point of the test isn't to spend half an hour trying to chase a panicked squirrel around as it bounds from wall to wall.

The trainer stands in front of you with a clipboard. "Your final test —" he starts to say.

Before he can finish his sentence, you grab the squirrel, snap its neck in your hands, and toss the still body onto the floor before it can start to cool. "Done," you say. "Can I move into the dorms now?"

The trainer presses his lips thin. "There's a week waiting period —"

" _Now_ ," you say, and the words curl into a snarl.

A pause, then the trainer sighs. "As long as the paperwork's in order," he says, "then I suppose you can move in tomorrow."

He signs the papers the next morning, and the less you think about that night, the better.

* * *

You can't remember the last time you cried — or rather, you can't tease it apart, all those nights blur together in a mix of helpless rage and despair — but you remember this one because it makes no sense. You're in the Centre office with the Head Trainer and another as witness, and you sign your name on the thick white paper and you say the oath with your fist over your chest, and everything is exactly how you thought it would be.

The Head Trainer smiles and hands you a brand new uniform, folded in crisp lines, and tells you that someone will show you to your new room.

"Does it lock?" you burst out. That's not what you're meant to say, you're supposed to say thank you and _it's an honour_ and _I'll do my district proud_ , but oh well, too late now.

He blinks. "Your room? Yes, of course it locks."

That's when you cry.

* * *

The next few years are good. You don't have to be the best, just good enough to stay, and that's not hard. You're strong and you're smart and you're fearless; there's nothing anyone can do to you that's worse than what you've already seen.

You don't make friends, but that's okay because you're not meant to. You don't have to worry about anyone touching you because they keep the boys away and there are plenty of other girls to kiss for those who want to, they don't need to pester the stuck-up bitch who doesn't talk to anyone.

The trainers sigh at your acting scores, but you're done acting, done pretending and saying what other people tell you to and nothing is going to change that. And so they sigh, but your combat skills are top shelf and your kills have the highest rating in your year, and that's what matters. Besides, the boys don't have to act, every other male tribute from Two is a stony-faced behemoth who barely says a full sentence in one go, so it really is pretty hypocritical to demand that the girls all be excellent at showmanship.

It's good until one day in the winter of your senior year, when a group of you are talking during free time, the kind of conversation that's low and half-whispered while you all look around to make sure the trainers aren't listening. One of the girls tells you about District 1, about the rumours of what they have to do to pay back their win.

You listen and a cold, creeping horror spreads through you, freezing you from the inside out. "I'd die if that happened to me," says another. "Can you even imagine? There's no going back from that, how could anyone ever get over it?"

"I know I couldn't," says a third. "It would ruin every relationship after that forever. Nobody wants to be with someone with that kind of trauma, it's too much pressure, and no guy wants damaged goods anyway."

"I'd rather die than be a victim for the rest of my life," says the second, tossing her curls for emphasis.

For a second the world turns white and shifts beneath you, but you dig your nails into your palm and everything settles. "Me too," you say, and they all glance at you, surprised. They probably didn't realize you were even listening, since you never talk during free time.

* * *

When your name appears on the Volunteer list three days later, you're smart enough to recognize the sign. You should be scared, probably, or worried, or pressured, or something, but instead all you feel is peace and calm, maybe for the first time in your life.

Six more months, you think, standing there in silence while the others shout and cheer, and some clap you on the back and some glare at you and some stand in the corner and whisper. Six more months and this will all be over for good.

* * *

You cross the square and climb the stairs and stare out at the crowd as the escort swoops in with the microphone and a flurry of glitter loosed from her hair. You wonder if he's out there, watching, what he's thinking as he looks at your image projected on the giant screen off to the side. If he'd be proud, or angry, or frightened. If he'd even recognize you at all.

"What's your name, dear?" the escort titters.

"Sloane," you say, loud and strong and clear. Your voice bounces back to you from the wall at the back of the square, and you raise your head and bare your teeth for the cameras.

You are Sloane, of District 2. The name Sloane means warrior, and Sloane will never be afraid again.


End file.
